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Two years ago, Martha Alanoca and her husband were trying unsuccessfully to start a family. In Bolivia, where Martha lives, the prohibitively high cost of private sector fertility clinics prevents many couples who want to have children from getting the help they need to make this dream a reality...Read more

IUDs give you cancer. The pill makes you fat. If you have sex, you won’t grow taller. These are only a few of the myths young people eagerly shouted out when asked what they had learned about sex before coming to CIES, our Member Association in Bolivia. Of the fourteen young people gathered in the...Read more

When asked how many hours she works in a day, Ana Cleotilde Gallardo Rodríguez—or Cleo—tilts her head back and laughs. “I have no schedule,” said Cleo. “I attend to people at midnight, at dawn… when people need me, when they can come.” Once, Cleo helped a woman safely deliver a baby in the middle...Read more

Twenty-one-year-old Margarita Bernard’s first pregnancy came as a surprise midway through her final year of high school. “I was not looking to become a mother,” said Margarita. “I started having sex, but I had no idea about contraception.” Margarita, who shares two rooms with her mother and six...Read more

In a speech given at the Commission on Population and Development (CPD) in 2013, Chilean President Michelle Bachelet—who was the Executive Director of UN Women at the time—emphasized the connections between women’s empowerment, sexual and reproductive rights, and sustainable development. "Our goal...Read more

“You don’t have to be gay to be a supporter; you just have to be human.” – Daniel Radcliffe, actor and gay rights activist This simple quote speaks to the importance of LGBTIQ activism in the post-2015 development agenda. The post-2015 agenda should take a human rights based approach to development...Read more

It’s time that young people were talked to and not talked about. It struck me even more clearly when I was a meeting of young activists in Hong Kong recently. A friend and colleague put it perfectly when he said that he was tired of filling a "tickbox quota"—sick of being chosen to speak simply...Read more

The term "vulnerable populations" is used by health professionals to refer to people who are hard-to-reach and, therefore, tend to have greater unmet health needs. In Bolivia, one of the most vulnerable populations is homeless children who are living on the streets. A UNICEF report published in...Read more

Human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccines can prevent approximately 70% of cervical cancer cases and provide an opportunity to significantly reduce the number of deaths attributed to the disease. Because of the lack of effective screening programs to identify pre-cancerous lesions when they can easily be...Read more

According to a recent report by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, Honduras has the highest homicide rate in the world. People are killed in Honduras at more than twice the rate than that of El Salvador, Guatemala, and Jamaica – all countries known for having high levels of violence...Read more